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Lot Essay
This work and the following lot illustrate one of the most important episodes in the history of mountaineering, which was reported in all the European newspapers at the time. The artist depicts the fatal fall of four men following the first ascent of the Matterhorn in Switzerland on July 14, 1865. The Matterhorn was then the last of the Alpine peaks over 4,000 meters to be conquered by mountaineers. It was the rope team, led by the great English mountaineer Edward Whymper (1840-1911), that reached the peak, the moment depicted in this drawing.
However, during the descent, four renowned mountaineers (Douglas Hadow, Lord Francis Douglas, Reverend Charles Hudson, and their guide from Chamonix) fell to their deaths, depicted in the following lot. Only three climbers in the group survived: Edward Whymper and the Zermatt guides Taugwalder father and son.
This event had a great impact, especially in the Chamonix region, which lost one of its best high-mountain guides. Gustave Doré seized upon the story. He fully captured the tragedy of the incident by showing the mountaineers in mid-fall surrounded by rockfalls. The French publisher and engraver, who also played a prominent role in the dissemination of the artist's illustrated works, believed that Gustave Doré, himself a mountaineer, had met, or at least corresponded with, the mountaineer Edward Whymper before creating his drawings (A. Lyall, ‘The Matterhorn Lithographs of 1865. Gustave Doré and his links with Edward Whymper’, The Alpine Journal, C, 1995, p. 215).
Two other drawings from the same series are preserved at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. One depicts the moment of excitement when all the mountaineers stand at the summit of the mountain, the other, the moment of the fall, but seen from a different angle, with the Matterhorn seen in its entirety, surrounded by a cloudy sky (inv. RF 29946 and RF29947; P. Kaenel, Doré. L’imaginaire au pouvoir, exhib. cat., Paris, Musée d’Orsay, and Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada, 2014, pp. 210-212, ill.).
Two lithographs by Doré entitled Ascent of the Matterhorn were published in the year of the ascent in 1865 (Paris, BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, inv. AA-4 (Doré, Gustave); G. Forberg, Gustave Doré. L’Œuvre Graphique, Paris, 1976, II, pp. 1226-1227).
This Romantic artist offers us, in these two large compositions, a dramatic and menacing vision of the mountain; the landscape is both sublime and picturesque, almost surreal, the atmosphere stormy, wonderfully rendered thanks to this monochrome palette of brown and black, enhanced only by white.
However, during the descent, four renowned mountaineers (Douglas Hadow, Lord Francis Douglas, Reverend Charles Hudson, and their guide from Chamonix) fell to their deaths, depicted in the following lot. Only three climbers in the group survived: Edward Whymper and the Zermatt guides Taugwalder father and son.
This event had a great impact, especially in the Chamonix region, which lost one of its best high-mountain guides. Gustave Doré seized upon the story. He fully captured the tragedy of the incident by showing the mountaineers in mid-fall surrounded by rockfalls. The French publisher and engraver, who also played a prominent role in the dissemination of the artist's illustrated works, believed that Gustave Doré, himself a mountaineer, had met, or at least corresponded with, the mountaineer Edward Whymper before creating his drawings (A. Lyall, ‘The Matterhorn Lithographs of 1865. Gustave Doré and his links with Edward Whymper’, The Alpine Journal, C, 1995, p. 215).
Two other drawings from the same series are preserved at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. One depicts the moment of excitement when all the mountaineers stand at the summit of the mountain, the other, the moment of the fall, but seen from a different angle, with the Matterhorn seen in its entirety, surrounded by a cloudy sky (inv. RF 29946 and RF29947; P. Kaenel, Doré. L’imaginaire au pouvoir, exhib. cat., Paris, Musée d’Orsay, and Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada, 2014, pp. 210-212, ill.).
Two lithographs by Doré entitled Ascent of the Matterhorn were published in the year of the ascent in 1865 (Paris, BnF, Department of Prints and Photography, inv. AA-4 (Doré, Gustave); G. Forberg, Gustave Doré. L’Œuvre Graphique, Paris, 1976, II, pp. 1226-1227).
This Romantic artist offers us, in these two large compositions, a dramatic and menacing vision of the mountain; the landscape is both sublime and picturesque, almost surreal, the atmosphere stormy, wonderfully rendered thanks to this monochrome palette of brown and black, enhanced only by white.